Synergy of fruit wastes derived hybrid biofillers and PLA on tribological response of 3D printed biocomposite: A comparative study and parametric optimization by Taguchi design of experiment

The present work was sought to develop an additively manufactured biocomposite by utilizing a biodegradable polymer namely, polylactic acid in 95 wt.% and fruit wastes derived hybrid biofillers composed of banana peel powder and orange peel powder in 2.5 and 2.5 (wt.%), respectively for tribological applications. Two-body sliding wear performance of the developed biocomposite for a Taguchi-designed experiment by considering four (04) different wear parameters were performed. The combination of the parameters that minimizes the specific wear rate was the normal load, sliding distance, sliding velocity and emery grade of 10 N, 500 m, 3 m/s and 150, respectively giving a minimum specific wear rate of 0.03426 × 10⁻⁶ mm³/N-m. The identified suitable parameters can effectively reduce the specific wear rate of the biocomposite up to 89.91 %. The observations of the worn-out surfaces have revealed the deformation of the matrix, debonding of fillers, micro-cutting, etc., as the wear mechanism.